Charles Gracey was born to Edith (née Down) and Garfield Gracey in 1935 and grew up in Curries, Ont. His interest in the livestock industry was sparked in 1947, when his father’s small dairy herd was depopulated during the national bovine TB eradication program.

Gracey graduated from Guelph’s agricultural sciences program in 1959 and started his career at the Kemptville Agricultural School. Later, as the secretary-manager of the Ontario Beef Improvement Association, he pushed for beef cattle performance testing and a cattle marketing check-off. Similar check-offs were adopted by other provinces, which led to funding for a national beef producers’ association.

In 1970, Gracey joined the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association (CCA), as it was then known. Serving as the association’s executive vice president, he advocated for Canfax, which provided information on cattle prices and future market outlooks. Gracey worked closely with Canfax’s founder, Chris Miller, and developed analytical programs still used within the agency. During his time at the CCA, he also focused on animal health issues, including the eradication of brucellosis in the Canadian herd.

Gracey also helped develop standard dressing procedures at packing plants and spent much of his career creating and refining carcass grading systems. He also helped establish the Canadian Beef Grading Industry, the Beef Information Centre as well as a national cattle identification program for cattle, leading to the creation of the Canadian Cattle Identification Agency.

Global trade was another primary concern for Gracey. Upon joining the Canadian International Trade Tribunal, he adjudicated everything from international trade disputes to complaints around government procurement.

Getting good information into the hands of beef farmers and ranchers was always near the top of Gracey’s list. In 1978, he created BeefWatch, a market report produced by Canfax and published in Canadian Cattlemen magazine twice yearly to this day. He helped establish the Beef Information Centre to link the beef industry to the public. He contributed to several farm magazines throughout his career and into retirement, publishing with Canadian Cattlemen as recently as 2022. Asked about invoicing for his work, he responded that he was “careless about being paid” for his “scribblings” and was motivated primarily by his concern for the industry.

In retirement, Gracey still devoted much of his “leisure time” to industry issues, and believed in freely sharing his analysis with the public. On his personal website, Gracey wrote that carcass grade information “should flow freely to producers so that they can use grade information for its intended purpose of improving the product.” A “lack of individual animal ID” once obstructed that flow, he added, but that obstacle was removed years ago. His website includes grading information, articles and analyses, plus a downloadable spreadsheet that demonstrates the cattle cycle’s effects on the national cow herd.

Gracey’s dedication to the industry and thoughtful, frank analysis of the issues inspired the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association to nominate him for the Canadian Agricultural Hall of Fame, and he was inducted in 2001.

Gracey was survived by his wife, Donna (née Luce); his sister, Evelyn O’Leary (Bev); brothers, David (Coline) and Donald (Nancy); his children, Laurel, Patrick (Barbara), Darren (Anna), and Matthew (Jennifer); and grandchildren, Peter, Noah, Catherine (Aaron), Madison, Fiona, and Alec. His family will hold a celebration of life this summer.

The closing lines of his obituary were fitting to those who knew him.

“Though his heart failed him, it never failed us. In lieu of flowers, support your local butcher.”

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That was the message as CanFax made the rounds in Manitoba in mid-January to present the latest economic forecasts to producers.

Why it matters: A string of hard production years was followed by a surge in calf and feeder prices, but that also has implications for producers looking to rebuild.

Brenna Grant, executive director for the organization, expects the strong price trend that began in the latter half of last year will continue.

“We’ve had a challenging three years here with lots of supply and demand shocks impacting agricultural commodities in general, but really, we started to turn a corner in June of ’22,” she said.

While Manitoba was wet last season, rains last summer eased feed concerns for parts of Western Canada still struggling with drought, she noted. That allowed producers to grow critical winter feed and stem the flow of cattle to the auction ring.

CanFax reported tightening North American beef supplies.

“We’ve probably shrunk the North American supply by so much over the past two years that it really is going to be a driving factor in improving prices for the foreseeable future,” said Manitoba Beef Producers president Tyler Fulton.

From January to December 2022, Canadian feeder prices saw their highest jump since 2015. Cattle were worth about 15 per cent more by the end of the year.

That translated to gains in the fall calf market. In Manitoba, local calf prices were 30 to 50 cents a pound higher than in 2021.

“We’re expecting that trend to continue in terms of supplies tightening over the course of the year, with greater impact happening by the time we get to summer and into the third quarter,” Grant said.

Prices have likely peaked, according to CanFax, but are expected to remain strong this year.

Feeder prices in 2023 are also expected to see support from a strong futures market and a downward shift in feedlot placements. CanFax forecasts that placements will be down 20 per cent in the third quarter compared to drought-swelled numbers in 2021, and down 11.5 per cent in the fourth.

CanFax expects to see the impact of “stickier” factors this year that have yet to trickle down into the cattle market, including a stronger market basis. Canadian fed cattle are at the weakest basis since 2014 as U.S. supplies tighten faster than those here.

Similarly, there has yet to be a true reflection of the shifting Canadian dollar, said Grant.

“One of the things that we always have to remember in a price rally like this is high prices cure high prices,” she cautioned, noting a high feed grain market, higher interest rates, exchange rate volatility and higher costs for fuel.

She urged producers to consider these factors in their risk management plans.

“I recognize that it’s really hard in an inflationary market in terms of controlling costs,” she said, so producers should focus on things they can control.

For Manitoba, eastern marketing options add another shot of optimism.

The Ontario market has been strong, with a stronger basis compared to the West, Fulton noted. Overall, he said he likes the trajectory that the eastern influence has had in Manitoba over the last five years.

“It is a strategic advantage that we should have and do benefit from in Manitoba,” he said. “We do have choices. Those animals can go to the top bidder, whether that be east, west or even south.”

Inflation and the consumer

High grocery prices add risk to the sunny forecast. Canada’s consumer price index increase doubled last year compared to the previous year (up 6.8 per cent in 2022 compared to 3.4 per cent in 2021), hitting a 40-year high. Food costs rose above those numbers.

Canadians paid an average 8.9 per cent more for food in 2022, according to a Jan. 17 report by Statistics Canada, and several fall months saw double-digit inflation.

In early December, Canada’s Food Price Report suggested that groceries would cost five to seven per cent more in 2023.

Beef consumers so far have been “resilient” against those pressures, Grant said, but cautioned that demand might erode.

“[Consumers] are going to have to make choices and that’s why we’re monitoring our price relationship with substitutes such as pork and poultry, because as long as we maintain our historical price relationship with them, we tend to see trading down within the category — between steak to hamburger versus trading away from beef,” Grant said.

In cow-calf centric Manitoba, Fulton said Canadian feedlot demand will be the deciding market factor and he would not be surprised to see calf prices gain another 10 per cent, “which is needed, because we’ve simply fallen behind other commodity groups and the gains that they’ve seen in profitability.”

In rebuild mode

Strong calf prices are great for the people selling animals, but they’re a conundrum for producers looking to rebuild. Those buyers are wary of buying expensive animals only to see the market drop before realizing a return.

In 2022, some in Manitoba’s industry noted herd liquidations despite high prices, which they linked to several consecutive years of drought and unfortunately timed snowstorms. In summer 2022, Statistics Canada put Manitoba cow-calf numbers at 682,200, down from 787,800 four years before.

Some level of liquidation is not unexpected, according to Grant. Price rallies are often taken as an exit cue for those close to retirement or who are otherwise on the fence about remaining in the industry. The sector saw similar exits during the mid-2010s, she noted.

But producers can learn lessons from those who bought bred stock during price rallies in 2014 and 2015, Grant said.

“There was a period of three to four months where, for $600 per head, you could trade up from a heifer calf to a bred heifer and then have a calf the next spring,” she said. “But if you waited, you then saw a huge jump in the breeding stock market and those cows that were bought at that high probably never paid themselves off.”

Grant cautioned producers to know their cost of production when buying stock or retaining replacement heifers.

J.P Gervais, vice-president and chief economist with Farm Credit Canada, also pointed to the cattle market’s last major surge, when there was speculation about a grand rebuilding of Canada’s herd.

That never happened, Gervais said, noting difficult production conditions. Producers instead maintained their numbers during that time, he said, and a few good years allowed them to make up for recent hardships rather than expand.

“I’m afraid that this is, perhaps, a little bit of what we’re going to see,” said Gervais.

Assuming no major blows to feed production this year, Fulton hopes the market will recover margins for both the feed yard and cow-calf producer and whet appetites to build back herd numbers.

He used the example of recent 2024 April fed cattle futures, which creeped within a few cents of an all-time high.

“There’s a lot of optimism that we could get back to levels that we saw six years ago…which would just be an injection of a huge amount of optimism and hopefully give the industry a boost to start rebuilding,” he said.

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Tyler Fulton, president of the Manitoba Beef Producers, estimates that local calf prices are 30 to 50 cents per pound higher than at this time last year, making it one of the best seasons the industry has seen since 2015.

“Whether or not it’s really going to help the herd rebuilding component, it’s probably still too early to tell,” he said.

“There’s no doubt that cash flow has been extremely tight in the industry, especially after the drought last year, and really, there’s not a huge appetite to be buying in at current prices when everything is just so fresh.”

Why it matters: Prices have helped sweeten the outlook for cattle producers, but it’s hard to say how that might affect industry retention.

Although slaughter volumes have been lighter than usual, fed cattle prices have been setting new highs for the year, a positive sign for cow-calf producers, says Canfax, the market analysis arm of the Canadian Cattle Association.

“Yearling grassers are about 15 per cent stronger than prices last year. Calves are up about eight per cent,” said Canfax executive director Brenna Grant.

It’s a major change, market analyst Brian Perillat also noted, pointing out that fall weaned steers had been in the same trading range since 2017.

“Right now, most of these calves were well over $2.50 to $2.60,” said Perillat, agribusiness specialist with More than Just Feed in Strathmore, Alta. “We could see a lot more strength in these calves, depending on what the grain market does. We’re 40 to 50 cents higher than we have been for the last few years for calf prices, so that’s pretty positive.”

Prices started rising in July and the upward price trend looks to have legs, he said.

“There’s a lot of strong fundamentals on the cattle side. It’s going to turn into a supply story – finally.”

It has taken a few years to play out.

“The U.S. cattle herd peaked back in 2019, and they’ve kind of been selling off,” said Perillat. “We just continued to fight a backlog of cattle for the last couple of years. With them getting rid of a bunch of cows, and working through these backlogs and drought cattle, it looks pretty promising from a supply point of view. Cattle prices will go up and start going up.”

Perillat also noted the impact of last year’s significant cattle imports from the U.S.

“We were a net importer in 2021 of almost a quarter of a million head of cattle. That kept our feedlots full. We just had big supplies through spring and summer. We’ve worked through some of that.

“(However) the very high feed costs were also motivating feedlots to sell cattle as soon as they could. We worked through some of the glut of cattle somewhat quickly as well. That’s going to help us get to some tighter numbers this year and maybe next year.”

Still bleeding

The interplay of higher prices, reduced herds and farmer fatigue has yet to shake out in Manitoba’s cattle sector.

Those who were forced to reduce herds in 2021 may worry about being forced to “buy high,” after selling animals low last year, Grant said during a webinar hosted by the Beef Cattle Research Council in early September.

Fulton said current prices may encourage those already considering an exit from the industry. Despite margins potentially creeping higher, hay and pasture land are hard pressed to match the opportunity cost of running cattle when compared to grain production, he noted.

“We’re probably still looking at canola and wheat prices that are double what they were five years ago, but we’re obviously not looking at that kind of gains in the cattle market yet,” he said. “If you’ve got land that is flexible in its use, then it’s really still a tough sell in rationalizing it, in putting it down to forage.”

It is too early to predict a premium on bred cattle this fall, Fulton said. The last three months of 2022 will tell that tale.

The window is still open on AgriRecovery aid through Manitoba’s Herd Management Drought Assistance program, centred on rebuilding cattle genetics lost to drought, although producers would have had to register earlier this year. The program, which joined feed and transport assistance programs unveiled in 2021, promised $250 per head for female breeding beef cattle, elk or bison, or $50 a head for sheep or goats replaced between the end of March 2022 and January 2023. That replacement could either be purchased females or heifers retained from the farm’s own herd.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that Manitoba’s cattle sector continues to lose farmers, according to Fulton.

Calves from some of the province’s largest cow-calf producers were lost during freezing conditions this spring in a string of late winter storms. That added insult to injury, given an already smaller anticipated calf harvest thanks to herd reductions in 2021.

“For anybody that really struggled with it and was already on the fence, those are the individuals that likely did pull the plug,” Fulton said.

“Then, the question is, did they have somebody in the next generation or did they have a young entrepreneur that was willing to take on that risk and grow their herd and take over some of that pasture land that would go unused?

“I’m optimistic that that’s where the opportunity lies for some of the young guys that are looking to grow, but I don’t know if we’re going to get as many coming in as we’re going to need in order to maintain the herd as we see the older demographic start to retire.”

Feedlots

Optimism in the cattle industry is almost more important than cash, said Charlie Christie, a rancher, grain farmer and feedlot owner from Trochu, Alta.

“The money is important, but the optimism is so important to keep driving forward,” he said.

The rise in prices after tough years that included drought and packer processing backlogs during the pandemic, has given some “an opportunity to get out,” he added.

“You could look at that as a positive as well,” said Christie. “There’s an abundance of feed and they’re able to get out at a reasonable price, rather than being forced out at whatever you can get. Even at the darkest place of the whole thing, I can see a positive side of it.”

The cattle herd has shrunk in the past few years, and it’s still shrinking, he noted.

“I think there’s a few good years of prices ahead of us. My daughter and son-in-law are building their cow herd right now, and it’s good to see them get into it where they can build some equity and get in a stronger footing for the next go-round.”

Meanwhile feed costs are finally coming down.

“The really big thing is that we’ve seen barley prices drop 15 per cent since the end of June and that’s already been supporting both the yearling and the calf market, which are stronger than last year,” Grant said last month.

The forage season has also offered some relief, although putting up dry hay has been a challenge in Manitoba, with many first cuts were overly mature or of poor quality due to rain.

In mid-August, the Manitoba Forage and Grassland Association noted uncertainty over hay prices, given variability in quality and unknown harvest numbers on greenfeed and second cuts.

A needed break

Cow-calf producers have had a tough slog, especially with the drought. They need some relief, said Perillat.

“They’ve spent a lot of money to feed the cows over the last year. Prices are good, but it doesn’t mean big profit margins for the cow-calf guys, either. Hopefully, next year, we’ll see even better things going forward for cow-calf producers.”

The outlook is also far brighter for feeders as fat cattle have been fetching close to $1.80 a pound.

“For August, that’s a very strong price,” Perillat said. “That’s the highest we’ve seen since 2015. Feedlot owners paid a fair amount for calves last fall and they’ve had to feed extremely expensive feed.

“For the first half of 2022, feedlots were not doing well and were often losing money, but now we’re getting close to a break-even at least.”

Cow slaughter is up one per cent in the West, and exports to the United States are significantly larger, added Grant.

“We are expecting a smaller cow herd on Jan. 1 in the West,” she said. “In the East, they’ve actually had stronger culling of their cow herd and that includes both beef and dairy cows. They’re going to be also having a smaller cow herd on Jan. 1.”

Add it up and the supply-demand equation should favour producers, she said.

“In terms of the U.S. and Canada, we are going to have a much smaller calf crop coming forward, which means tighter supplies. There is probably going to be competition for those calves, which will support prices.”

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“We have record-high wholesale beef prices right now,” CANFAX manager and senior analyst Brian Perillat said at the recent (and virtual) Canadian Beef Industry Conference.

Unfortunately, cattle prices are just not responding.

“That’s been frustrating for a lot of producers and the industry,” he said. “But tides will change. The typical cattle cycle is: We overproduce, plug the system in terms of bottleneck at processing, and then we shrink. This will rebalance over time as the market readjusts.”

For most of the year, the beef cut-out price relative to pork was cheaper than it has been for quite a few years (largely because pork prices have risen, too).

“Overall, red meat prices have been extremely strong,” said Perillat.

And strong demand looks set to continue. The impact of African swine fever, which decimated China’s pig herd, still lingers as the nation attempts to build its domestic supply. As well, drought hit Australian production hard (dropping it from the world’s No. 2 exporter to the No. 5 spot).

Those and other factors mean there were declining global meat supplies in 2019 and 2020, which hasn’t been seen before, said Perillat.

“We’re seeing some shifts around globally. All of that is supporting the beef market and supporting our wholesale meat prices.”

One of the biggest drivers is declining cattle numbers in the U.S., where the herd peaked in 2019.

“As we head into 2022, this will be the third consecutive year that we will see smaller cow numbers and smaller cattle numbers in the United States,” said Perillat. “We’ll have about a million less breeding stock at the middle of the year, and about half a million fewer cattle outside of feedlots in the United States.”

American cattle production will be flat this year but “we will start to see the herd decline. Their replacement heifer numbers are down,” he said.

Drought and very high grain prices are major factors, although the need for supply has drawn in some dairy cattle.

“Some of these dairy calves and crossbred calves are coming up in the Canadian industry as well as getting fed and finished and processed in Canada,” he said.

Over the past few years, the United States has shifted between being a net exporter of beef and a net importer.

“It’s back to being a net exporter this year,” said Perillat. “China has stepped up from being a small importer 10 years ago to being the largest beef importer in the world. We continue to see impacts of that.”

Canada has continued to have strong exports, well above 2020 levels, even though last year was a bit of an anomaly because of supply chain issues.

“Even last year, when we saw exports down slightly, we had record-high values. Volume was down last year three to four per cent, but value was fractionally higher.”

Canadian exports are up a billion dollars from 2015 and 2016 (and 10 per cent since 2019) because of strong international demand.

That’s true domestically, too.

“We’ve seen some of the strongest demand levels we’ve seen in the last 30 years,” he said.

“Despite all the rhetoric around cattle, and cattle production, and beef production and markets, consumers continue to spend a lot of their protein dollars on beef.”

However, don’t take those customers for granted, he warned.

“We do see those prices jumping higher and we have to watch how consumers start reacting to these higher prices.”

This year, prices have stayed high but consumption has levelled off.

There was no pullback from higher prices last year, but there were flat consumption levels.

The other big factor to watch is whether the steadily declining Canadian herd sees a big drop in numbers because of the drought. Late-season rains may have stopped as many cows from going to market, and some producers may have found feed, he said.

Aside from the massive decline in the herd in Canada, beef production is strong and healthy, he said.

The industry has the highest slaughter rates in a decade along with larger carcass rates. The feedlot sector has continued to grow, and there are about 15 per cent more feedlots than 2015.

Alexis Kienlen is s reporter for the Alberta Farmer Express. Her article appeared in the Sept. 20, 2021 issue.

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“Prices were volatile and then very flat in the second half of the year,” commented Brian Perillat, manager and senior analyst for CanFax.

He noted that prices for fed cattle on the Prairies were roughly $15 to $20 per hundredweight lower compared to a year ago.

Besides the pandemic, Perillat said the increase in the Canadian dollar adversely affected the market as well. The loonie, particularly over the last few months of 2020, surpassed the 78-U.S.-cent mark, which made Canadian exports more expensive.

Dianne Riding, president of the Manitoba Beef Producers (MBP), noted that prices were hit and miss throughout the year.

“We have seen some producers get fairly decent prices. Some of the prices were not quite as good as folks would have hoped for,” she said.

“We are very thankful that we could still market livestock. It could have been a whole lot worse,” Riding added.

When the first round of lockdown measures were imposed earlier this year, MBP along with its provincial counterparts, the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association and the Livestock Marketing Association of Canada lobbied federal and provincial governments to declare cattle an essential service.

However, a few factors going into prices were out of the control of cattle producers, such as the backlog of cattle at feedlots. With COVID-19 a number of slaughter plants in Canada were forced to close temporarily, causing a buildup of cattle in the feedlots.

“It’s taken us pretty much the entire calendar year to work through that backlog,” said Perillat, noting that at one point feedlots were losing $200 to $250 per head.

One element he cited that helped eliminate the backlog was transitioning away from providing large amounts of beef to restaurants to channelling much of that product to the consumers.

Other than prices, Riding mentioned a few other issues that affected Manitoba cattle producers. One example being the increases in rent on Crown lands during the last couple of years. Another issue being the lack of informed access of people venturing on those Crown lands rented by producers. A third being the need for a new system to evaluate those Crown lands after a producer has improved them with new fences or watering systems.

The MBP president acknowledged progress was made with the provincial government regarding legacy leaseholders, who are now able to transfer those lands to family members. Also, she said the province is providing funding for a joint project with MBP and the Manitoba Sheep Association to deal with predators.

While the feed shortage in Manitoba was largely rectified during 2020, Riding pointed to the Arborg and Ashern areas in the Interlake region where some producers still had shortages.

“We are very thankful to the grain industry that allowed them to access straw this year,” she said.

Over the course of the first couple of weeks of January, Manitoba’s cattle auctions will resume their sales. Check with your local auction.

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The organizations involved in Canada’s National Beef Strategy — the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association, Canada Beef Breeds Council, Beef Cattle Research Council, Canada Beef, The National Cattle Feeders’ Association, Canadian Meat Council and Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef — have announced a new set of industry goals for 2030.

Why it matters: The new 10-year goals have been touted as Phase 2 of the 2020-24 National Beef Strategy.

Goals have been announced for three areas so far — greenhouse gas and carbon sequestration; animal health and welfare and land use and biodiversity — with another four to come next year.

“It was really iterative, starting with looking at the literature of what our current benchmarks in Canada were and what the data we had available to us was,” said Brenna Grant, Canfax manager and one of those presenting the goals at their launch Sept. 16.

“We were really looking at Canadian research before going out and interviewing people with expertise in individual areas, whether it was researchers, veterinarians or producers.”

Among the goals, industry groups hope to, “safeguard the existing 1.5 billion tonnes of carbon stored on lands managed with beef cattle,” and half the food waste between the secondary processor and consumer.

On top of that, the industry would see an additional 3.4 million tonnes of carbon sequestered every year through grazing management and a focus on soil health. That number reflects a scenario where all tame pasture and hay acres sequester carbon at half of the 70-year historical rate, the team developing the goals has said.

Strategy groups eventually hope to add carbon sequestration to the National Inventory Report, submitted by the federal government to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change every year. The groups have tapped environmental consultants Viresco Solutions for a road map towards quantifying soil organic change on pasture and grassland.

The goals would also see the industry’s greenhouse gas emission intensity drop by 33 per cent, a number based around “breakthrough scenario” models.

“We looked at what our long-term performance was in a number of areas and said, ‘What if we just continued to do what we have historically?’” Grant said. “And then we talked about some major breakthroughs — major breakthroughs in terms of technology and innovation or major breakthroughs in terms of adoption rates for certain practices.”

Goals targeted to maintain native grassland and encouraging ecosystems on grazing land will help protect those carbon gains, fact sheets put out by the groups have also said.

The 2016 census of agriculture noted a 4.4 per cent decline of tame and native pastures from 2011 to 2016 as more producers opted for annual crops.

“We knew that we needed a market mechanism in order to achieve this,” Grant said. “So yes, focusing on economic viability of producers, but also by supporting programs that incentivize conservation and working with other crop groups across Canada to make sure that this happens.”

Animal health

On animal health, the industry hopes to see 92 per cent reproductive efficiency in Canada’s cattle herds (up from 85 per cent reported in 2018). The 2030 goals would also refocus breeding on traits that support animal health such as calving ease and polled genes, encourage management strategies around things like pain relief, and create a national monitoring system to track practices. Goals around antimicrobial resistance would clarify and communicate best practices.

Many of those animal health goals also tie back to goals on carbon, according to Dennis Laycraft, executive vice-president of the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association. Laycraft linked low greenhouse footprint with genetics, management and, “real, key indicators on efficiency.”

At the farm gate

For the average producer, implementing the industry’s goals will be mostly about increasing that efficiency in each operation, Laycraft said.

“Some of it’s extension,” he said. “How do we share best practices?… The second part of it is obviously working with our industry partners. That’s the great thing about the National Beef Strategy. We effectively have everyone together, so there’s a stronger information loop through this system.”

Laycraft also pointed to Canada’s sustainable beef value chain, structured around the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef framework. That program offers producers a per-head payment for moving cattle through the chain of custody.

There is no “easy way of communicating with all producers or many producers,” he noted, pointing to the wealth of organizations, grazing clubs and provincial industry groups across the Canadian beef landscape.

Laycraft used the example of feed additive research that might lower greenhouse gas emissions when added to cattle rations. Organizations like the Beef Cattle Research Council do that type of work, he noted, but the challenge then becomes conveying that information most effectively to the producer.

“The main sort of platform through this is really focusing on what tools that we can provide to the industry that helps them manage this, makes operations more efficient,” he said.

According to documents on the strategy’s website, some of those tools include increased vaccination, the adoption of different pasture management and low-stress handling, increased extension, encouraging feed plans, body condition scoring, and feed testing, pursuing more research on pasture management, and more extension and education, among others.

Some of those tools might come with some reluctance at the farm gate, given additional cost and tight profit margins, Laycraft acknowledged.

“At the end of the day, the main reason for vaccinating or for all of these practices should be to improve the efficiency and health of your herd and, by doing that, it should improve returns back… We’re looking, with all of these things, trying to create the win-win environment,” he said.

“They’re ambitious goals,” Laycraft later admitted, “but our producer network that we worked with when we set this up really encouraged us to follow ambitious goals. I think Canada will be one of the world leaders and, at the same time, it is our goal to make sure whenever we do this we actually make our industry stronger in the process.”

The organizations expect to launch 2030 goals on water; beef quality and food safety; human health and safety and technology next year.

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“Last week, we were steady to five cents per pound higher when compared to last year,” said Brian Perillat, senior analyst at Canfax in Calgary.

“Calf and feeder markets are doing well, all things considered.”

Perillat said mid-weight steers around the 800-lb. range were around $200 per hundredweight, which is “pretty strong.”

However, on the feedlot side, fed cattle prices were still slightly depressed due to large volumes of cattle. Many feedlots across North America had to shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“There will be a lot of cattle to work through in September to October,” Perillat said.

“We’ll have to see what fed cattle prices are and how much losses feedlots will be incurring.”

Cattle market participants will also be watching the Canadian dollar, as a strong loonie will influence beef exports to the U.S.

On Aug. 27, the dollar closed at 76.17 U.S. cents, up from 75.79 U.S. cents a week earlier.

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“It’s been an interesting couple of weeks,” said Brian Perillat of Canfax in Calgary. “We’ve seen weakness recently in the cash markets.”

Perillat believed that spring highs reached their peak last week, when 900- to 1,000-lb. feeder steers saw prices in the $162- to $179-per-hundredweight range. This week, prices for the same weight class ranged from $135 to $160/cwt.

Prices on feeder cattle over 800 lbs. have come down by eight cents per pound, said Perillat.

“Looking at bigger supplies over the summer, fed cattle will get lower.”

Prices at markets in the United States are facing pressure as well, as many cattle have been moved to feedlots for the summer.

“That means there are a lot more coming to market in summer and early fall,” said Perillat. “Markets are pretty defensive for that reason.”

Pasture conditions and hay prices will be significant indicators of cattle markets going into summer, as most feeder cattle and calves are out to pasture until late summer.

“If there’s moisture and guys have grass, we should see five-weight calves up around $240-$250 range, which is strong,” Perillat remarked.

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With fewer slaughter cattle coming to market each week, prices remained fairly even, lifting up three to five cents per pound in some areas. Some slaughter cattle stayed local, with higher-quality cattle heading east into Ontario and Quebec.

“Fed cattle prices in Western Canada have continued to improve over the last few weeks,” said Brian Perillat, manager and senior analyst at CanFax.

Similarly, feeder cattle and calf prices have improved.

“Feeder cattle prices were slow to come around, but they’ve picked up modestly over the past weeks,” Perillat said. “Tighter supplies and good demand are holding things together.”

Harold Unrau, manager at Grunthal Livestock Auction Mart, said markets are seeing fewer slaughter cattle every week, as many were sold in the fall and winter due to concerns of feed shortages.

At Grunthal’s March 26 auction, feeder steers under 400 lbs. fetched $210-249 per hundredweight (cwt) while those in the 400- to 500-lb. range went for $200-$265, according to reports.

Similarly, at Heartland Livestock Services in Brandon, feeder steers under 400 lbs. fetched prices between $255 and $268. Cattle in the 400- to 500-lb. range went for $232-$239.

Fewer feeder cattle headed to the United States than observed in previous weeks, as several states continue to battle inclement spring weather and flooding.

“There’s some going south but not very many, due to prices and weather,” Unrau said. “It’s hit and miss. One week some go down and the next none go down.”

As for future prices, “I think we’re going to see a steady market with not too much change,” Unrau predicted.

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Going into December, 365,791 head had been sold in Manitoba so far during 2018, up from the 362,899 head sold in all of 2017, according to data from Manitoba Agriculture. This made for back-to-back years in which the number of cattle sold increased, after 311,650 head were auctioned in 2016.

Brian Lemon, general manager of Manitoba Beef Producers (MBP), said adverse weather throughout 2018 had a major role in the problems cattle producers faced during the year.

“Producers were late in getting their animals out on the pastures. The longer they keep them off the pastures, the more they have to feed them. The more they feed them, the more it costs,” he said, adding a lot of producers managed only one cut of hay this summer and pastures didn’t regrow very well.

“We’re hearing a lot of stories of cattle that came back off of the pasture a lot lighter (than the producers) would have liked to have seen them come off in normal years.”

Brian Perillat, manager and senior analyst at Canfax, agreed with Lemon’s assessment.

“We had a higher cow culling rate this year. Partly from winter storms and cows that lost calves earlier on,” he said, noting herd sizes are likely to shrink a little in 2019.

Despite the gloom brought on by the weather, prices brought a little bit of shine to the industry. Lemon said prices generally stayed strong in Manitoba, thanks to demand from Ontario.

“The Ontario slaughter plants came into Manitoba to look for supply and that helped to prop up our prices,” he said.

On the downside, he continued, producers forced to cull their herds in preparation for winter were faced with declining prices.

Perillat noted Canadian prices for most of 2018 were “kind of flat” and largely reflected those in 2017.

Helping the industry was the weak Canadian dollar. When it stays under 78 U.S. cents, it’s supportive of cattle prices, he said, but expansion of the U.S. cattle industry countered with downward pressure on Canadian prices.

For 2019, Perillat said limited expansion in Canada and the possibility of a new packing plant at Balzac, Alta., should help prices.

But Lemon is concerned about the ‘Wall of Beef’ in the U.S. and how it could affect prices.

“With record production expected in the U.S., combined with trade uncertainty out of the U.S., we’re really going to have to watch to see what happens with prices moving forward,” he said.

At the start of 2018, feeder steers (400-500 lbs.) were selling at $230 per hundredweight (cwt) and by April had slipped to $219/ cwt, according to Manitoba Agriculture. By September, the steers went for $241/cwt and started December at $231/cwt.

Heifers (400-500 lbs.) began January at $201/cwt and peaked in March at $217. They fell to $197/cwt in June and recovered to $219 in late September. By the beginning of December they went for $195/cwt.

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